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THE 

EARLY RENAISSANCE 



IN 



ENGLAND 

[jt, THE REDE LECTURE 

DELIVERED IN THE SENATE-HOUSE 
ON JUNE 13, 1895 



BY 



MANDELL CREIGHTON, D.D. 

LORD BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH. 



CAMBRIDGE : 
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. 

1395 
Price One Shilling. 



THE 

EARLY RENAISSANCE 



IN 



ENGLAND. 



Sontion: C. J. CLAY and SONS, 

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE, 

AVE MARIA LANE. 

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THE 

EARLY RENAISSANCE 



IN 



ENGLAND 



THE REDE LECTURE 

DELIVERED IN THE SENATE-HOUSE 

ON JUNE 13, 1895 



BY 



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LORD BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH. 



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V 



THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 
IN ENGLAND. 

It is sometimes worth while, even for a 
lecturer, to look at the rock whence he was 
hewn, and to content himself with explaining 
why he exists. This is the humble purpose 
which I have set before myself Other lecturers, 
in their yearly courses, have celebrated the 
advance of science, or have unfolded the de- 
velopment of thought. I would ask you to go 
back with me and consider some of the causes 
which made this progress possible, some of 
the labours of forgotten men by whose good- 
will and zeal our intellectual heritage has been 
slowly built up. When Sir Robert Rede founded 
this lectureship in 1518 he did so because 



6. THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

he wished to enrich the University with oppor- 
tunities which it had not possessed before. He 
wished to broaden its studies by favouring that 
New Learning which was changing men's views 
about the world and life. My object this 
morning is to discover the motives which 
probably weighed with him and explain the 
meaning of what he did. 

The Renaissance is a familiar theme ; and 
its history in Italy has been elaborately studied 
of late years. Perhaps so much has been r 
written about it that its main features have been 
somewhat obscured. Italy was the home of the 
Renaissance movement, and attention has been 
chiefly given to the most exaggerated forms 
which it there assumed, while its simpler, I 
might almost say its normal, development, has 
been somewhat overlooked. Let me try and 
put before you in its simplest form the chief 
object of that intellectual movement which we 
have agreed to call the Renaissance. 

The great formative power of ancient life 



IN ENGLAND. 



was the culture derived from Hellas. Culture 
after all means an attitude towards life, and the 
attitude expressed by Hellenic thought was one 
of clear outlook upon the world, frank accept- 
ance of things as they were, and resoluteness 
in clothing them with beautiful form. These 
qualities of the Hellenic mind were to some 
degree impressed upon the sterner and more 
practical mind of Rome, which gave them wide 
dominion. But Rome, with all its capacity for 
action, lacked the faculty of preserving by 
perpetual readjustments the spiritual concep- 
tions on which natural life must ultimately be 
based. Each step in Rome's expansion left 
it poorer in actual contents, till it fell through 
sheer exhaustion. In the downfall of material 
civilization, in the miseries of barbarian in- 
vasions, the new power of Christianity alone 
survived and was strong enough to build up 
again the life of man upon an enduring basis ; 
but the task was enormous, the struggle was 
arduous, and amid the general wreckage only 



THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 



such elements of the old civilisation survived 
as had been absorbed by Christianity. This 
revived society bore manifold traces of the 
conflict which had been necessary to train 
and discipline the conscience to an abiding 
sense of duty. But as society became more 
settled, as material civilisation was again re- 
covered, as men had more leisure, and life grew 
richer, the need was felt for fuller recognition of 
the primary and immediate objects of that life 
— of the thoughts and fancies and passions 
of which each man was directly conscious in his 
individual experience. There had been such an 
expression once; it must be recovered. Italy, 
as the most ancient nation, felt most keenly the 
need of regaining its forgotten treasures. The 
Renaissance was the movement for this purpose. 
At first the movement was unconscious, and 
it is difficult to fix upon a time which made 
it definite. But it seems to me that the im- 
portant crisis in the fortunes of any movement 
is that which impresses its aim upon the 



IN ENGLAND. 



imagination of the multitude. Such an im- 
pression was made by one who is not much 
recognised in this connexion, by Francis of 
Assisi. The unconscious purpose of his life 
was to find peace for himself by freedom from 
all common ties and conventions, so he might 
live unfettered and unhindered in joyous com- 
munion with God and man. All the world 
was his, because he called nothing his own : all 
men were his brothers ; the delights of outward 
nature, the companionship of birds and beasts, 
were his to the full, for God bestowed them 
upon him. His life was a poem which told 
of the joys of liberty, of earth's loveliness, of 
the delight of human intercourse founded on 
pure love. Francis announced, in a way that 
could not be forgotten, that it was possible 
to have a clear outlook on the world, to see 
in things as they were a promise of what they 
should be and to clothe them with beauty. II 
admit that his message was delivered fantastic- 
ally, that its method was impossible for ordinary 



io THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

men, but it was a message none the less. Its 
spirit was not forgotten. It created the great 
theologians of the succeeding age : it lies at 
the bottom of all that is loftiest in Dante : 
it inspired the art of Giotto. It went far to 
make all these men possible, because it prepared 
men's minds to understand their object, and 
sympathise with their efforts to set forth the 
unity yet variety of life. Be this as it may, 
there was ever after the time of Francis a 
constant endeavour to grasp human character , 
with all its powers and capacities ; and the 
scientific means towards this end was the study 
of classical literature. Italy gave itself to this 
object, and its separate states vied with one 
another in their zeal. Plato lamented that in 
his days the study of geometry was neglected 
because no state held it in sufficient repute. 
The Italian city communities were convinced 
that the pursuit of classical culture was an 

object of political importance. Scholars were 

I 

esteemed as public benefactors ; they enjoyed 



IN ENGLAND. n 

i 

exceptional advantages ; they were freely sup- 
plied with leisure for their studies ; their lectures 
were crowded. It was as disgraceful for a man 
of position not to be a patron of scholarship, as 
it would be nowadays if he refused to subscribe 
to the local hospital ; everyone was bound 
to be interested in literature, and show his 
good taste by some addition to the beauty 
and enjoyment of the common life. 

The band of scholars which was thus pro- 
duced was divided into two great parties, a 
division which seems to be inevitable in all that 
man attempts. The object of their efforts was 
to explain and set forward the individual. How 
was this to be done ? by taking the existing 
individual and developing its powers ; or by 
the creation of a new form of character, eman- 
cipated from existing shackles, and frankly 
formed upon the antique model ? This was \ 
the question which divided the Humanists. 
Both parties were agreed about the paramount 
importance of classical studies, both were 



12 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

opposed to the old-fashioned modes of thought 
and means of education. But one party wished 
to expand, the other to subvert ; one party was 
Christian and progressive ; the other was revo- 
lutionary and pagan. 

It was only in Italy that this pagan party 
found strong support, and expressed itself with 
freedom. All movements tend to be judged by 
their extreme representatives. Much that has 
been written about the Renaissance in Italy 
treats its most extravagant exponents as typical 
of all, and does not adequately distinguish. 
But when we attempt to consider the influence 
of the Renaissance outside Italy, as I am trying 
to do, we must clearly differentiate three classes 
of students. First of all, there were the men of 
the old school, who were assiduous students of 
classical literature, but used it as a help to their 
own pursuits. Secondly, there were the Hu- 
manists, who wished to extend the old studies, 
and improve the old methods of education, and 
take a freer outlook over the world. Thirdly, 



IN ENGLAND. 13 



there were the Poets and rhetoricians, who cared 
nothing for the contents of life, but taking them- 
selves as they were, strove only after beautiful 
expression, and gloried in a freedom from pre- 
judice which they would have all men follow. 

It is a matter of some interest to see how 
England was affected by this movement. The 
first class of scholars was, I think, strongly 
represented, and English writers early show the 
influence of considerable reading of the Classics. 
For instance, the chronicler William of Malmes- 
bury, who died in the middle of the twelfth 
century, tells us that his object in writing was 
"barbarice exarata Romano condire sale," to 
season with classical flavour the barbarous 
chronicles of his predecessors. The object and 
phrase in which it was expressed are alike 
worthy of a Florentine of the best period. I 
have come across one testimony to a knowledge 
of classics in England in early times which is so 
remarkable, and so difficult of explanation, that 
I think it worth mentioning even at the risk of 



14 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

seeming pedantic. ^Eneas Sylvius, who certainly 
knew MSS., says that in the Library of St Paul's 
in London he found an ancient history, written, 
according to its colophon, six hundred years 
before, that is, roughly speaking, about 800 to 
850 B.C. " The writer of this history," he goes 
on, " was noted as the Greek Thucydides, whom 
we know by report to have been famous : I 
found, however, no translator's name." England 
was indeed far in advance of the rest of Europe 
if at that early date it possessed a student 
capable of translating Thucydides. However 
this may be, England produced in the fourteenth 
century one of the earliest collectors of books. 
Richard of Bury, bishop of Durham, was a type 
of the omnivorous student: even on his journeys 
he carried a library with him and sat surround- 
ed by piles of books so that it was difficult to 
approach him. He left his large library to 
Durham College, Oxford ; both college and 
library have passed away, but the treatise which' 
he wrote on the care of books and the proper^ 



IN ENGLAND. 15 



ordering of a library still remains and gladdens 
the hearts of librarians. Moreover Richard 
visited Italy and was a correspondent of Petrarch. 
Yet we cannot class him as a Humanist. His 
conduct towards Petrarch shows a lamentable 
want of interest in the problems which exercised 
the men of the New Learning. Petrarch meet- 
ing an inhabitant of the distant north enquired 
eagerly his opinion about the identification of 
the island of Thule. Richard answered that 
when he had returned home he would consult 
his books, and would then be able to satisfy his 
enquirer's curiosity. This we now know to be 
the proper answer for a professor to give, but 
wholly unsuited to a University Extension 
lecturer and still more to a man of letters. 
Further, though Petrarch frequently wrote to 
remind Richard of his promise, he received no 
answer : " so that," he sadly remarks, " my 
English friendship brought me no nearer to 
Thule." It may be urged that Richard knew 
nothing about the subject on which his opinion 



16 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

was asked ; but the duty of a scholar was to 
disguise his ignorance by drawing attention to 
the beautiful style in which he could clothe it 
with irrelevant remarks about everything else. 
Certainly a man who lost an opportunity of 
writing a long and elegant Latin letter to 
Petrarch, even though he had nothing to say, 
has no claim to be considered a Humanist. 

Indeed this story shows that England, even 
at that time, exercised great caution in receiving 
foreign influences. Englishmen, when abroad, 
were doubtless as sympathetic as their pro- 
verbial stiffness enabled them to be ; but when 
they returned home external impressions rapidly 
passed away and insular stolidity again possess- 
ed them. This is seen in the case of Henry 
Beaufort, bishop of Winchester, who visited 
Constance during the Council in 141 7. He 
posed so successfully as a man of letters that 
the great Florentine scholar Poggio Bracciolini 
trusted to his vague promises and came to 
England hoping to enjoy the benefits of his 



IN ENGLAND. 17 



patronage. But Poggio's sojourn was one con- 
tinued disappointment. Such of the monastic 
libraries as he searched contained no classical 
MSS. The English nobles lived in the country, 
occupied in agricultural pursuits, and were wool 
merchants instead of patrons of letters. Their 
chief enjoyment was eating, and they cared 
more about the quality of the food than the 
refinement of the repast. Poggio found no 
sympathetic souls, and after waiting for eighteen 
months to see what the bishop of Winchester 
would do for him, the mountain produced a 
mouse. He was offered a small benefice, miser- 
ably below his expectations. He was so dis- 
appointed that he did not choose to allude much 
afterwards to his English experiences, and we 
are deprived of an interesting record of our 
illiterate forefathers. 

But better days were at hand ; and it is 
strange that no rumour reached the ears of 
Poggio of the literary taste shown by Humphrey 
Duke of Gloucester, who provided what Eng- 



< 



18 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

land had not hitherto enjoyed, a distinguished 
and wealthy patron for scholars. Where Hum- 
phrey acquired his fondness for letters it is hard 
to say. He was educated at Oxford, and in his 
lifetime enriched the University with so many 
valuable books that he may be regarded as the 
founder of the Bodleian Library. We know, 
however, of no teacher in Oxford who can 
have turned his mind towards the New Learning ; 
and his busy and adventurous life seems averse 
from literary pursuits. Yet Humphrey is the 
nearest approach in England to an Italian 
prince, and he was recognised as a congenial 
soul by Italian scholars. He set himself to 
bring Italian influences into England, and he 
succeeded in turning the attention of some 
towards the acquisition of a polished style. 

In this he was helped by the fact that the 
Council of Basel drew many Englishmen abroad, 
and brought them into personal contact with 
Italian scholars. One of these Italians es- 
pecially, ^Eneas Sylvius Piccolomini, had a 



IN ENGLAND. 19 



happy geniality of manner, and a power of 
exhibiting the practical value of that versatility 
of character which is the result of culture. 

^Eneas had his way to make in the world, 
and early learned to turn his hand to anything 
that needed doing. He was a keen observer, a 
man of ready sympathy, an excellent exponent 
of the substantial value of a good education to 
enable you to find plausible reasons for what it 
was expedient for you to do. Amongst others 
whom he trained in the art as well as the 
science of scholarship was an Englishman, 
Adam de Molyneux, who died in 1450 as bishop 
of Chichester and Keeper of the Privy Seal. I 
do not know that the temper of New Learning, 
or the hopes of its followers in England, can be 
better expressed than in a somewhat patro- 
nising letter which ^Eneas wrote to his English 
disciple : 

" I read your letter with eagerness, and 
wondered that Latin style had penetrated even 
into Britain. It is true that there have been 



20 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

amongst the English some who have cultivated 
the eloquence of Cicero, amongst whom common 
consent would place the Venerable Bede. Peter 
of Blois was far inferior, and I prefer your 
letter to any of his. For this advance all 
gratitude is due to the illustrious Duke of 
Gloucester, who zealously received polite learning 
into your kingdom. I hear that he cultivates 
poets, and venerates orators ; hence many 
Englishmen now turn out really eloquent. For 
as are the princes so are the people ; and ser- 
vants progress through imitating their masters. 
Persevere therefore, friend Adam. Hold fast 
and increase the eloquence you possess : con- 
sider it the most honourable thing possible to 
excel your fellows in that in which men excel 
other living creatures. Great is eloquence ; 
nothing so much rules the world. Political 
action is the result of persuasion ; his opinion 
prevails with the people who best knows how 
to persuade them." 

Let me remark in passing that these words 



IN ENGLAND. 21 



were written in 1444. They may make us 
doubt if the growth of democracy has done so 
much as we commonly think to develop the 
methods of politics. 

I will not weary you by any account of the 
Italian scholars whom Duke Humphrey patro- 
nised. It is enough to say that he did every- 
thing which befitted a literary prince. He has 
the merit of causing Latin translations to be 
made of two such works as the Politics of 
Aristotle and the Republic of Plato. Besides 
translations he encouraged the writing of such 
treatises as the age enjoyed, discussions of 
questions of no particular meaning for the sake 
of gathering round them a certain amount of 
recondite knowledge, of exercising dialectical 
skill and exhibiting the beauty of a classical 
style. The subjects resemble those which 
virtuous schoolboys might presumably choose if 
they were left to select topics for essays — e.g. 
the difference between virtues and vices : or, a 
comparison of the life of a student and that of 



22 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

a warrior. Besides receiving such compositions 
from others Humphrey was himself a letter- 
writer, and sent presents of books to other 
princes, with appropriate remarks on the fitness 
of the work for the character of its recipient. 
Further he welcomed in England an unknown 
Italian, who took the high-sounding name of 
Titus Livius, and constituted himself the bio- 
grapher of Henry V. Nor did Humphrey 
neglect English writers ; he befriended Pecock, 
Capgrave and Lydgate. I do not see that he 
omitted anything which became one who formed 
himself on the best Italian model. 

In this endeavour he was followed by a 
nobleman who went to Italy and there studied 
to perfect himself in his part, John Tiptoft, 
Earl of Worcester. Tiptoft attended lectures at 
Venice, Padua, Florence and Rome. He rambled 
alone through the streets of these cities, going 
where chance led him, and drinking in the in- 
herent charm of Italy. He addressed ^Eneas 
Sylvius, who had become Pope Pius II., in a 



IN ENGLAND. 23 



speech of such exquisite Latinity that it brought 
tears into the eyes of that too susceptible pontiff. 
He was a good customer to the great Florentine 
bookseller, Vespasiano di Bisticci, who has placed 
him, as the only Englishman, among the great 
scholars of the time whose lives he wrote. 

But Tiptoft learned more from Italy than 
Englishmen approved of. Into the unscrupulous 
politics of the dark days of Henry VI. he 
introduced an Italian carelessness of human 
life. The people hated him for his cruelty and 
called him "the butcher of England." His 
Italian biographer tells us that, when he was 
beheaded on Tower Hill in 1470, the mob cried 
out that he deserved to die because he had 
brought to England the laws of Padua. I think 
that this is an undue charge against English 
insularity, great as it was ; and that the mob 
cried out against his use of the treacherous 
methods of Italian politics. Anyhow Tiptoft is 
a conspicuous example of that truth, so often 
taught and so constantly disregarded, that 



24 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

when a scholar takes to politics his scholarship 
does not save him from occasionally losing his 
head. 

The troubled times of the Wars of the Roses 
dashed the prospects of court patronage; but 
the tradition still remained. Even so staid a 
king as Henry VII. had a court poet and 
historian, Bernard Andre, a native of Toulouse. 
Andre's poetry is irrepressible. We wish he 
had told us more facts and sung us fewer Sap- 
phic odes, which are at best an imperfect medium 
for conveying accurate information. Moreover 
Henry curiously favoured some Italians who 
came to England in the unpopular capacity of 
collectors of the papal dues. One of them, 
Giovanni dei Gigli, did his best to throw some 
romance over Henry's prosaic marriage by a 
fervent Epithalamium, which gave England some 
excellent political advice. For this and other 
services he was made bishop of Worcester, in 
which office he was succeeded by his nephew, 
and afterwards by another Italian, Gerolamo 



IN ENGLAND. 25 



Ghinucci. The practical sense of English kings 
combined patronage of Humanism with require- 
ments of diplomatic service, and paid for both 
out of the revenues of the Church. Yet these 
men were useful in their way as means of 
literary communication with Italy. Ghinucci 
engineered at Rome Wolsey's plan for founding 
Cardinal College out of monastic revenues, and 
was employed to seek for books, and order 
transcripts of Greek MSS. He even sent 
Wolsey catalogues of the Libraries of the 
Vatican and of Venice, that he might select such 
books as should be most useful for the Library 
of his College. Another Italian, Polidore Vergil 
of Urbino, was not so fortunate in winning 
Wolsey's favour ; but he avenged himself by 
writing a history of England in which Wolsey was 
steadily depreciated. Its graceful Latinity made 
it for a long time the current history of England 
on the Continent, while England refused to 
believe that a foreigner could really understand 
its affairs. In yet another quarter Italian in- 



26 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

fluences directly operated on England. It was 
long before natives could write Latin letters with 
freedom; and Henry VIII. 's Latin Secretary, 
Andrea Ammonio of Lucca, was a close friend 
and a kindly instructor of the eminent English 
scholars of his time. 

I have said enough about the foreign side of 
the Renaissance in England. English learning 
was not affected by courtly patronage, nor was 
it much influenced by the presence of foreign 
scholars. The pursuit of style had little attrac- 
tion for Englishmen, nor did those who strove 
after it acquire any great facility. Very few, if 
indeed any, seem to have learned from the 
Italian scholars who were brought to grace 
courtly society. Such Englishmen as wished to 
learn went for that purpose to Italy, where they 
prepared themselves to vie with the Italians on 
their own ground. In the middle of the fifteenth 
century we find a small body of Oxford men who 
responded to the impulse given by the Duke of 
Gloucester, and wandered to Italy to seek there 



IN ENGLAND. 27 



that instruction which England could not give. 
These self-selected Humanists have scarcely 
been appreciated as they deserve, and I would 
venture to trace the outlines of their careers. I 
think the first to set the example was William 
Grey, of the family of Lord Grey of Codnor, 
who after learning what he could at Balliol 
College went to Cologne, which was in advance 
of England in logic, philosophy and theology. 
But Grey had a desire for classical culture, which 
Cologne could not supply, and resolved to seek 
it in Italy. Being a man of wealth, he lived 
with some state; and the burghers of Cologne 
found him so profitable a resident, that they 
were unwilling to let him go. To escape from 
their embarrassing hospitality he had to feign a 
serious illness, and then flee by night with his 
complaisant physician, both disguised as Irish 
pilgrims. He went to Florence, where he ordered 
a library of books : thence to Padua, and finally 
to the great Italian teacher, Guarino, who was 
then lecturing at Ferrara. He was made by 



28 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

Henry VI. his representative at the papal court; 
and the great literary pope, Nicholas V., so 
admired his learning that he nominated him 
bishop of Ely in 1454. It is to be feared 
that bishop Grey's scholarly tastes found no 
response in the University of his diocese. At 
all events he passed by Cambridge, and set his 
hopes of a classical revival on his old College 
at Oxford, to which he gave a large sum for the 
purpose of building a library, which was to hold 
the literary treasures acquired in Italy. His 
collection amounted to two hundred MSS., 
many of which still remain. 

It would seem that Grey had made friends 
at Balliol of men likeminded with himself, who 
listened to his enthusiastic reports of the excel- 
lence of Guarino's teaching and set out to join 
their comrade at Ferrara. The first of these was 
John Free, a poor student whose expenses were 
probably paid by Grey. Free, besides Latin and 
Greek, learned botany and also medicine, which 
he both taught and practised at Padua and 



IN ENGLAND. 29 



Florence. He was, however, above all things a 
scholar, made several translations from the Greek, 
and wrote a cosmography. He went to Rome 
where Pope Paul II. testified to his merits by 
appointing him bishop of Bath in 1465, but he 
died before consecration. 

Free, in his turn, invited to Italy another 
Balliol friend, John Gunthorp, who as soon as he 
had learned to make Latin speeches returned to 
England, was employed by the king for the 
purpose of going on complimentary embassies, 
which the decorum of the fifteenth century rigor- 
ously demanded, and finally was made dean of 
Wells. There he built the deanery house, much 
of which still remains, bearing clear traces of the 
influence exercised by Italian architecture on 
the new houses which were beginning to replace 
the castle. Gunthorp has some interest for us, 
for he was for a time Warden of King's Hall 
(which was absorbed into Trinity College) and 
bequeathed some of his MSS. to Jesus College, 
which was founded a year before his death. He 



30 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

obviously had greater hopes of Cambridge than 
had his friend Grey. 

There is yet another who belonged to this 
curious band, Robert Fleming, who stayed at 
home till he was appointed dean of Lincoln, 
and then joined his friends at Ferrara. Thence 
he went to Rome and was in time appointed 
English representative at the papal court. He 
had a country house at Tivoli, where he com- 
posed a long Latin poem in honour of Pope 
Sixtus IV., to which he gave the title Lucubra- 
tiones Tibtirtince, to mark, I suppose, that it was 
the work of a busy man in villeggiatura. 

I have wearied you with these details. But 
they were necessary to prove my conclusion. 
There was no real interest in scholarship in 
England. Patronage could not create it, nor 
could foreign example plant it and make it 
grow. The only result of the attempt was to 
kindle interest in a chosen few, who went to 
Italy in search of a career, and when they 
returned to occupy eminent posts at home felt 



IN ENGLAND. 31 

that they had left their literary life behind them. 
All that they could do was to provide books 
and leave them where others in happier times 
might read them. England was exceptionally 
callous to the attractions of culture, as such. 

These men were Latinists, stylists, engaged 
with form rather than content, opening out no 
new intellectual horizon. It was not till the 
value of Greek thought became in some degree 
manifest that the New Learning awakened any 
enthusiasm in England. An increase of know- 
ledge was worth working for, not a development 
of style. Englishmen were little moved by 
purely aesthetic perceptions. They were willing 
to accept what was proved to be useful, or true ; 
they were not much affected by what was only 
beautiful. English society in the fifteenth cen- 
tury was engaged in developing trade, and its 
tone was eminently practical. The nobles who 
followed the Italian model in developing their 
individuality were not appreciated and ended 
ill. The New Learning, if it was to take root 



32 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

in England, must come into definite connexion 
with English life and temper. 

It was another band of Oxford men who 
gave it this form, and so secured for it an 
abiding home. The first Englishman who 
studied Greek was William Selling, of All 
Souls College, afterwards Prior of Christ 
Church, Canterbury. In the monastery school 
he breathed his own enthusiasm into one of his 
pupils, Thomas Linacre, who with two friends, 
William Grocyn and Thomas Latimer, went to 
Italy for the special purpose of learning Greek. 
These men differed from their predecessors in 
that they were not wandering scholars, but were 
academic to the core. When they had learned 
what they wanted, they returned to Oxford and 
taught. Moreover they applied their learning 
to practice. Latimer and Grocyn were theolo- 
gians ; Linacre was the most eminent physician 
of his day. Grocyn showed what a knowledge 
of Greek could do for theology by proving that 
the treatise on " The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy," 



IN ENGLAND. 33 



attributed to Dionysius the Areopagite, could 
not have been written by him. This was the 
introduction of criticism into England. Linacre 
revived classical medicine, by his translation of 
Galen, and so prepared the way for its more 
scientific study. He left a considerable estate 
for the foundation of three lectureships in medi- 
cine, two at Oxford, and one at Cambridge. 

This brings me to a point which is of im- 
portance. As soon as it was seen that the New 
Learning had a vivifying influence on thought, 
an attempt was made to provide for it in the 
Universities. Doubtless this was largely due 
to the academic patriotism shown by Linacre 
and Grocyn. Their predecessors tried to 
leaven English life directly; they trusted to 
high position, to patronage, to their personal 
reputation, to their practical success. They 
entirely failed to produce any effect. England 
was slow to move, and was not to be fascinated 
by brilliancy. Culture did not radiate from the 
royal court or from the efforts of stray bishops. 
c. 3 



34 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

Englishmen in a dim way seemed to agree that 
the Universities were the organs of national life 
for the purpose of promoting learning. In fact 
I think that nowhere does the English temper 
show itself more clearly than in its relation to 
the Universities. Two centres of intellectual 
life came into being, we can hardly say how: 
but so soon as two existed, great objection was 
felt to the creation of any more. They were 
enough for local convenience. They were 
enough to excite emulation and display slightly 
different tendencies. Attempts to add to the 
number were rigorously suppressed. It seems 
as if the notion of two parties, to keep one 
another in order, was an ideal of early growth, 
and was dimly felt in the domain of learning 
before it was extended to the domain of politics. 
Anyhow England looked coldly on the New 
Learning till it forced its way into the Univer- 
sities and proved its practical utility. When it 
had thus attracted attention, had shown its 
power, and had declared its combativeness, it 



IN ENGLAND. 35 



received ready help. There was a desire to 
give it a fair chance, and allow it to prove its 
mettle in the places where questions respecting 
learning ought naturally to be decided. 

Perhaps one cause of the lethargy which 
certainly settled on the Universities in the 
fifteenth century was an uneasy feeling that the 
intellectual future belonged to the Humanists, 
who lived outside their influence and whom they 
could not assimilate. The Oxford Hellenists 
reassured men's minds of their loyalty to their 
Alma Mater, and a system of University Ex- 
tension was begun in consequence. In this 
Cambridge slowly and tentatively, with an eye 
to strictly practical results, took the lead under 
the influence of John Fisher. He was backed 
by a powerful patron, the Lady Margaret, whose 
generosity he cautiously diverted into academic 
channels. He began on a small scale with an 
object of immediate usefulness, the foundation 
of divinity professorships at Oxford and Cam- 
bridge, which should aim at teaching pulpit 



36 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

eloquence. On this point the adherents of the 
old and the new learning might agree. If style 
was to be attended to, if rhetoric was to flourish, 
it might as well be applied to the great engine of 
popular education. The professorship at Cam- 
bridge was soon supplemented by the Lady Mar- 
garet preachership, the holder of which was to go 
from place to place and give a cogent example 
of the new style of pulpit oratory, which was 
ordered to be free from " cavillings about words 
and parade of sophistry, and was to recommend 
God's word to men's minds by efficacious 
eloquence." I need not remind you that the 
Lady Margaret was so well pleased with the 
results of her new venture that she went on to 
found the colleges of Christ and of St John. 
Patronage had now been successfully diverted 
to enrich and extend the resources of the 
ancient seat of learning. 

It must, however, be admitted that the 
animating motive of Fisher's endeavours was a 
laudable desire to raise Cambridge to the level 



IN ENGLAND. 37 



which Oxford had already reached. The ex- 
ample of the early Hellenists still survived, and 
John Colet followed the example of his teachers 
Grocyn and Linacre in spending three years in 
Italy. On his return in 1496 he went to Oxford 
and as a volunteer delivered a course of lectures 
on S. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, in which he 
abandoned the scholastic method of interpreting 
sentence by sentence, or word by word, and 
endeavoured to discover the meaning of the 
whole. It is most probable that the effect 
produced by Colet's lectures suggested to Fisher 
the foundation of a professorship at Cambridge, 
by which the new method might have a secure 
footing and not depend on the personal efforts 
of individuals. Be this as it may, the fame of 
Colet, Grocyn and Linacre, to whom was added 
an attractive youth, Thomas More, made Oxford 
renowned, and drew thither the eager scholar, 
Erasmus of Rotterdam, who gives a charming 
picture of the delights of academical society. 
*' When I listen to my friend Colet," he wrote, 

3—3 



38 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

" I seem to be listening to Plato himself. Who 
does not admire in Grocyn the perfection of 
training ? What can be more acute, more 
profound, or more refined than the judgement 
of Linacre ? What has nature ever fashioned 
gentler, sweeter or pleasanter than the dispo- 
sition of Thomas More ?" Such a body of 
scholars, living and working together, sufficed 
to establish the reputation of Oxford, especially 
when such a man as Erasmus sang their praises 
to the learned world. 

Fisher steadily kept before his eyes a like 
possibility for Cambridge, and in 15 11 sum- 
moned Erasmus to teach Greek and lecture on 
the foundation of the Lady Margaret. I need 
not speak of this interesting episode in our 
history, as it is not long since Professor J ebb 
brought before you its picturesque significance. 
Erasmus tells how within the space of thirty 
years the studies of the University had pro- 
gressed from the old Grammar, Logic, and 
scholastic questions to some knowledge of 



IN ENGLAND. 39 



polite letters, mathematics, the renewed study 
of Aristotle, and the study of Greek. Cambridge 
has so flourished, he adds, that it can vie with 
the chief schools of the age. 

In fact, if the revival in Cambridge was 
slower and less brilliant than at Oxford, it was 
more secure, for it rested on the cautious and 
careful supervision of Fisher, who had the influ- 
ence of the Lady Margaret's new Colleges at his 
back. In Oxford the departure of Linacre, 
Grocyn, and Colet removed the spell of domi- 
nant personalities, which strangely enough has 
at many times lent a picturesque interest to 
Oxford which Cambridge can rarely claim. 
With their departure the glory of the New 
Learning departed also, as they left no equally 
distinguished successors. It was clear that, if 
Oxford had given the stimulus to new studies, 
Cambridge was more skilful in providing for 
them a permanent home. If progress was to be 
made, Oxford must copy the methods of Cam- 
bridge. The man who grasped this fact, and 



40 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

taught it to Wolsey, Richard Fox, bishop of 
Winchester, had special means of knowing it, 
as he had been Chancellor of Cambridge and 
Master of Pembroke. In 1516 Fox founded 
Corpus Christi College at Oxford, avowedly in 
the interests of the New Learning. But here 
again we may notice a characteristic difference 
between the two Universities. Fisher had gone 
his way quietly, without laying down new prin- 
ciples in such a shape as to awaken antagonism, 
content with slowly breaking down barriers and 
rinding room for the new studies by the side of 
the old. Fox on the other hand blew the 
trumpet of revolt, and his statutes breathe notes 
of defiance. His College is to be a beehive ; its 
lecturers are gardeners who are to provide 
wholesome plants on which the bees may 
browse. They are " to root out barbarism from 
the garden and cast it forth, should it at any 
time germinate therein." When metaphors are 
dropped, provision is made for lecturers who 
are to teach Greek and Latin Classical authors. 



IN ENGLAND. 41 



This, be it noticed, is the first establishment of a 
teacher of Greek in England, as previous efforts 
had been voluntary or else temporary. Still 
more significant was the provision for a Reader 
in Divinity, who is to follow the ancient doctors, 
both Latin and Greek, and not the Schoolmen, 
who are pronounced to be "both in time and 
learning far below them/' This was a bold 
declaration of war both in its depreciation of 
the Schoolmen, and in its recognition of Greek 
theology. It led to a formidable rising of the 
Old Learning, whose supporters dubbed them- 
selves Trojans, and assaulted the audacious 
Grecians in the streets. Fox's beehive was in a 
sorry plight, and its bees found it difficult to 
gather honey. More had to interpose with 
Wolsey, and Wolsey sent a royal letter com- 
manding all students in Oxford to study Greek. 
It was the handful of dust necessary to restrain 
the buzzing of the angry insects. But Wolsey 
made the matter sure by proceeding with the 
foundation of Cardinal College. 



42 THE EARLY RENAISSANCE 

Thus both Universities were brought into 
line, and the position of the New Learning was 
secured. It is not my purpose to carry its 
progress further. It was just at this time, in 
the year 1518, that Sir Robert Rede, who had 
been a fellow of King's Hall, and died as Lord 
Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, 
bequeathed by will to the University a small 
sum of money for the endowment of lecturers 
in philosophy, logic, and rhetoric. His bequest 
was an indication of the revived interest which 
was felt in the Universities, and of the desire 
that room should be found in them for every 
branch of knowledge. The spirit of his intention 
has been observed by the institution of this 
annual lecture, which recognises the usefulness 
of an occasional divagation from the ordinary 
course of studies, an occasional invitation to the 
members of the University to ramble into fields 
which are not mapped out and enclosed for that 
careful and methodical tillage which a Tripos 
Examination necessarily entails. 



IN ENGLAND. 43 



The history of Scholarship is generally dis- 
regarded. We commemorate our founders and 
benefactors without troubling ourselves about 
their immediate purposes and motives. It is 
enough for our gratitude to know that we are 
because they were. I fear that I may seem 
pedantic in having attempted the impossible 
task of condensing into an hour's lecture the 
beginnings of the New Learning in England. 
I did so from a sense of natural piety ; and I 
hope that I have established some links between 
the present and the past. England in the past 
showed much the same characteristics as England 
of to-day. It was not to be captivated by bril- 
liancy. It did not care for mere graces of style. 
It was unmoved by attractive novelties till they 
had showed a capacity for sending their roots 
below the surface, and gave promise of fruit as 
well as flower. Nor would England receive its 
learning from abroad. If there was anything 
worth having beyond the seas, let Englishmen 
go and bring it back, and adapt it to the shape 
in which it was fitted for home consumption. 



k 



44 THE EARL Y RENAISSANCE. 

Patronage and court favour might foster an 
exotic culture, but in that shape it would not 
spread. Further, England in a dull sort of way- 
trusted its national institutions, even when they 
were little worthy of trust. Learning was a 
matter for the Universities ; if they were not 
doing what they ought to do, those who were 
interested in the matter must set them right. 
Questions concerning learning must be decided 
in the places set apart for that purpose from 
time immemorial. New inventions were good 
wherever they came from, if they were proved 
useful ; but the goods for English consumption 
must be manufactured by the old established 
firms, and their premises must be enlarged for 
the purpose. Again I say, England trusted its 
Universities in the past. It is in consequence 
of that trust that I have had the privilege of 
addressing you to-day. I thought that I could 
not use the opportunity better than by recalling 
a fact which brings with it an abiding sense 
alike of dignity and of responsibility. 

Cambridge: printed by j. & c. f. clay, at the university press. 

L.ofC. 



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